New Blanket

I am still knitting even if I'm not blogging.  There are always reasons or excuses not to.  On several days it was too dark for taking photographs.  Then I got an e-mail saying that I was near my monthly allowance of broadband usage.  Today I will take the chance anyway.

I have started a new proper project, but I will write about my new blanket, #137, that I started several weeks ago.  This is one of the white blue green beige ones, so that I can use up some of the pale bright green and blue yarns.  It does not have the same feel of wool as #136 had, although there is quite a lot of wool there.  There is some acrylic but not much, and the remainder is what?  Some cotton, and I can't think of anything else.  I have come to the conclusion that I should use more old fashion pure wool DK yarns, because it feels so much better, instead of unravelled bought sweaters.  They don't feel so nice, even if they are pure wool.  I just have to get through the 50 odd sweaters in my store.

Here are two photographs of the blanket, one with flash and one without.

This if the first of the two unravelled sweaters bought from charity shops.  This one was bought because I could not resist it; in fact I could not resist the second one either.  It is a 1980s style large sweater in a slip stitch rib pattern with deep raglan sleeves in an off white colour.  There is a label in one side saying Jil Sander.  Can it really be Jil Sander?  The label does not have the name in large black letters as usual, but the name is quite clear.  Perhaps it was a sample.  It also says 50% alpaca 50% cotone, so made in Italy?  The yarn is nice and soft, several strands not spun together, slightly thinner than DK.  This is one of the easiest sweaters to unravel that I have ever experienced.  The seams were crocheted together, so once I found the end it took a second to undo.  The stitching was the same, and each piece came apart in a single thread from top to bottom.  I have not in fact used it for this blanket because I have plenty of pale coloured yarns that I want to use up first.

The second sweater, a cardigan, is my next Kaffe Fassett Persian Poppies pattern.  At least I thought it was when I bought it, but if it is it is a simplified version of the pattern.  I prefer to believe that it is anyway.  The cardigan is awful.  It is a children's size knitted in bright acrylics.  I bought it because I thought it was Kaffe Fassett and I saw it as an illustration of how awful his patterns can look in the wrong hands.  The knitter has gone to a lot of trouble to put the colours together, as you can distinguish the flowers against the background.  It is knitted tightly with the thinner yarns doubled.

I thought that there were some wool yarns in there and I told myself that I can throw the acrylics away.  Now that it is unravelled I can say that there were a few wool, but very few, and it is becoming very difficult to dump the others.  I tell myself that a few acrylic strands won't be noticed in a full sized blanket.

My first Kaffe Fassett Persian Poppies sweater was very nice.